I May Have Loved You Once
by AshioTeNerdio
Summary: Snake's encounter with Meryl in Eastern Europe resulted in cutting words being exchanged. The words hurt so much, that it reminds Snake of the times they had together after the Shadow Moses Incident, and now he's certain he'll never forget them, either.


I figured, with this being my first Metal Gear Story, that I ought to explain my inspiration behind this. Basically, I was playing The Twin Snakes (not MGS1 I'm afraid) and I realised how sweet it was when Snake became more affectionate towards Meryl at the end. Afterwards, I booted up MGS4, which I hadn't played in forever, to see where I was. I was at the end of Act 2, so I finished and Act 3 rolled on. When Meryl said "I may have loved you once, but you're too damn senile to face the truth", my heart sank. And then, with me recently playing MGS2 again, with Snake being Pliskin, I called him after he was asleep, and he mumbled something that sounded like Meryl's name. That's when it all clicked; he had to leave her, but for a certain reason. This is the story of why David decided to pack up and leave. Enjoy, and R&R if you so wish. -ATN

* * *

**Eastern Europe, 2014**

"Look Snake!" I pause, and turn my face away. "Just leave this to me. There's no need to put yourself in harm's way. Don't risk your life for no reason." I grumble, still not looking at her, and pretend to keep my focus on my lit cigarette, which I had barely smoked myself; it was slowly burning itself away. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her lean forward. Her voice softens; "Snake... what you're trying to do... it's not a mission."

"I know." I whisper. "It's not justice." I turn to her. "It's a hired hit."

She leans over the table, slams her fist against it. "If you know then..." She breaks off. The door behind us opens, to which I start having a coughing fit. I'm coughing and spluttering, and it's not easing up, though I notice she moves the ash tray towards me. As it eases, she puts her hand on my back, and then her hand on my cigarette-free one, which is resting on the table. She returns to a softer tone. "Look, our ways of thinking might be different, but to me, you're still a legend. A hero. I know all about the things you did when you were young. It was what kept me going. I can't bear to watch you die over something so pointless."

"Huh." I look up to face her. "Don't worry about me, old soldiers never die" I attempt to reassure, before taking a drag from my smoke. I cough again slightly, and the ash on the end of the cigarette drops off onto the table. Meryl grabs my hand again. "Your cause is our cause now." She reasons. "You don't have to do this."

Unfortunately, I do.

"I'm no hero." I say after a brief pause between us. "Never was. I'm just an old killer, hired to do some wet work." Silence. She bows her head in defeat. I sit there, motionless. I can hear her trying to silence her sniffling in an attempt to not cry, but I don't dare turn towards her. I look straight ahead.

"Fine..." She's sorted herself out. "Then we'll just have to catch him. Before you do." She stands up, and I'm still looking away.

"I may have loved you once..."

Damn... she really did all those years ago

She slowly turns towards me. "But now you're just too damn senile to face the truth." She leans closer. "Wake up and face reality." And with that, she raises her hand, and I look up, and with each word she says, which is said with pure venom, she pokes me in the chest.

"Old. Snake."

* * *

**Alaska, July 2005**

"David? You awake?" I come to and I see Meryl on top of me, her head against my chest. It's been five months since the Shadow Moses Incident, and things between us had been the most perfect time I've experienced in 33 years.

"Yeah." I murmur in reply.

"Dave?"

"What?"

"Thanks for agreeing with me in this."

"No problem."

"I mean, maybe with a bit of luck we can start a family now."

"Yeah..." I haven't told her, but I've figured out some things. I asked Otacon to do some research about the Les Enfants Terribles project back in '72. The details were kind of sketchy, but we got the rough outline of what had happened. Big Boss had been rendered sterile from nuclear tests prior to the 1960s. In the early 70s, he'd been knocked senseless and put into a coma, where they got hold of some of his cells, and altered them a bit to result in me and Liquid. They wanted a perfect clone of the greatest living soldier. However, they knew it'd be too dangerous for the clones to be able to reproduce, so that was removed out of my genes. A terminator gene was added too, which means I can't be cloned either.

That's all the details we managed to get out of the project, but I guess that's all I needed to tell Meryl. But I just can't bring myself to.

* * *

**Earlier that day**

"David...?"

"Yeah?" I reply with a cigarette between my teeth. My lighter's busted, which I toss on the coffee table in front of me in frustration. Meryl pulls something out of her pocket as she gets up and comes to my aid, to which I can now smoke the thing. Another lighter, which she hands to me. I pocket it.

"You do realise you're supposed to smoke outside, right?" She scolds playfully. I laugh in response, and play it off with a casual shrug.

"It's my home." I smirk.

"Our home, now." She laughs before sitting down beside me. "You know... there are 3 things I've wanted to do since I was young..."

"I know one of them's to become a soldier" I response. I'm not sure where this is going.

"And do you know any others?" I pretend to think, and I decide to mock her a bit.

"Well, I think Psyco Mantis told me this."

"What?" She looks puzzled. "Wait... I was aware of what he was forcing me to do... and say..."

"Yeah, the whole "Make love to me Snake, please" stuff, you remember that huh?" I joke, to which she blushes. "Yeah, I got it. All you've ever wanted to do is sleep with the legendary Solid Snake!"

"Kinda..."

"What?!" She's joking, right?

"I've always wanted to have a family, and there's no one I'd rather be with than you so..."

I nod slowly, with guilt building up in my throat. I can't reproduce, but I can't tell her. I take a drag and sit back on the sofa, with her cuddling next to me.

"I love you, David."

"I love you too Meryl."

* * *

**Evening, that same day**

I slide out of bed and get dressed, only to hear Meryl call my name. "Where're you goin'? She asks.

I pull out my packet of Lucky Strike smokes, hold them up and say; "I'm going outside quickly."

"Wait, what's with the quick escape?" she calls after me as I head out onto the balcony. I open the packet and remove the last cigarette, before crumpling the packet into my pocket. Crap, I've not got a lighter.

"Looking for this?" I turn around to see Meryl, in a dressing gown, holding a lighter up. She flicks it open, to which I light my cigarette before taking a drag.

"You always turn up whenever I don't have a lighter- how do you manage that?"

"I have my ways... look, you seemed upset about us having a family, is that why you got up?" She looks hurt. I step forward and hug her.

"No, it's just... family, I'd be no good as a dad." I hate lying. "Like... I'm a clone, how's that going to go down? Yeah, our kid'll be "Oh, my dad's a clone of his dad, my grandfather and father are genetically identical."

"But Big Boss is dead, and he's not exactly in open history. Besides, people wouldn't be able to tie you to the name of Solid Snake."

I keep going on. "And other family issues. No grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins on my side. It'd be a pretty small family for us."

"And that's the way I like it." She whispered. "Any other excuses?"

"Yeah. I'm too old to be a dad." She stepped back.

"Oh really? How old are you again?" She glared.

"Thirty three..." I looked down at my feet guiltily.

"Hell, people would think I'm too young to be a mother, I'm eighteen after all." She steps forward and clasps my hand. "Dave... we can do this, you and I. And besides, you think you'd be no good at being a dad, right?" I nod solemnly. "Well, picture this; it's 2012, and we have a son. He is six or seven years old. You're in the park, playing catch with him, except you throw the ball and he misses the catch-"

"Are you telling me I'm bad at throwing?!" I interrupt.

"Shh... Anyways, back to the scenario. The ball lands by a bunch of douchey teenagers, and they pick it up. Our son sees them pick it up and starts crying. You scoop him up and walk up to the teenagers, and ask politely for the ball back-"

"I'm not that polite at time-"

"Oh my god, can I just finish this?" She laughs, and I join. I grind my cigarette out on the railing and toss it onto the ash tray on the table beside us. "Right, you ask for the ball back, and the guys are like "No way". So, you put the boy down, tell him to turn around, and cover his ears and not look behind him until you tell him to. Then you kick those bastards' asses- Solid Snake-style!" We both laugh, as if this could really come to life.

Then I realise it can't.

* * *

**Late 2006**

We 'tried' to have a kid several months after that, but with no success, much to Meryl's disappointment. Well, she tried. I, on the other hand, decided to be a wuss and not tell her that I couldn't conceive. In fact, it took so long, we passed Meryl's 19th birthday, and my 34th, which are are the end and beginning of the year, respectively. We were even coming up to her 20th when she brought some news which I knew meant that my secret couldn't be kept forever.

"Good morning Mr Snake." I rubbed my eyes and looked to see Meryl sitting beside me. "I've booked an appointment with a fertility specialist, and it's today."

"You did what?" I said in disbelief.

"What's wrong?" She cocked an eyebrow.

"Nothing... nothing..." She just scowled at me, to which I got up and headed for the bathroom. I was growing a beard, and decided to go for a wet shave in order to escape from her questions. I camped out in the bathroom the whole day, until Meryl came home, stormed up the stairs and "knocked" on the door. It sounded like she was trying to kick it down, which wouldn't've surprised me if she actually was.

"DAVID!" She yelled. "Get your ass out of that fucking bathroom now!"

"What?" I yelled back. "Okay, I get it, you hate me now, is that right?"

"Just come out... please." I comply. "And I don't hate you, I'm just annoyed at how evasive you've been recently. Well..." She looks down at her feet. "For almost a year. Anyways, can we talk?"

"I'm not going anywhere now." I reply, and lean against the doorframe.

"Well, I had my appointment, and I'm fertile, which may suggest you're not... I think you should get tested, just in case."

My heart skips a beat and leaps into my throat.

"Dave? Is something wrong? You've gone pale..."

"Look... Meryl... I should've told you this right from the beginning... but... there's no need for me to be tested..."

"What...?"

"I don't even know where I should begin with this, and it's one helluva story."

"Go for it." She whimpered, somehow sensing that something was wrong.

"I was born in 1972, as a result of being a clone of the greatest soldier who ever lived- Big Boss. Of course, I wasn't aware of this, and was raised by about three different foster families. I was told my father visited me twice, once when I was two years old, and another time when I was twelve. I was involved in my first military mission when I was 19, with the Green Berets, and was involved in the Gulf War. I then joined FOXHOUND, and was known as Solid Snake. Of course, you're familiar with FOXHOUND way back then. Now, if you fast forward to the Shadow Moses Incident, I found out I had a twin; Liquid Snake. He told me roughly about what Les Enfants Terribles was all about, but it lacked specifics. Specifics I had liked to know. So after Otacon was picked up from the base, I got in touch with him and I asked him to do some digging about this project. And found out some of the details, but not a great deal. We only know three people who were involved in this- myself, Liquid and Big Boss. Big Boss was in a coma when they took his stem cells, so when he found out about me and Liquid, he was disgusted. Now, they wanted a clone of the greatest warrior of the 20th Century, hence my creation."

"David... you sound like you're talking about yourself as a machine..." She whispers.

"I am. I'm a killing machine, that's my purpose, nothing else. But they knew that a copy of the greatest soldier ever would be used somehow, or at least, there would be attempts. What Octacon was able to dig up... I've known for a year."

"What did you know David?" She says with tears running down her face. "What did you know?"

"The most important thing of this project, is that they didn't want copies of me. As a result, they included a terminator gene, so they couldn't clone me from my cells."

"Is that all?" She says with slight relief.

"No." I took a deep breath. "They didn't want these 'great soldier genes' being passed on. So... I can't-"

"-have kids, right?" She finished my sentence.

"Yeah."

"And you've known this for _all_ that time?" She spat. I nod. She erupts into a wave of sobs which rack her body.

"I'm sorry..."

"I just... I just wanted a family, something for us to share."

I step forward and take her into my arms. "We can adopt. I mean, I was adopted, and I had a happy childhood, despite moving around a bit. I mean, think about it- me and our kid, playing in the park, and I can kick ass if anything goes wrong."

Meryl chuckles softly. "You're right... I'm just being selfish, I mean, blood just makes you related. It's loyalty is what makes you family."

"Exactly. So we can sort this out next year?"

"Yes." She says as she buries her head into my chest.

* * *

**Early 2007**

Otacon's tip-off is something I can't ignore. Loads of Metal Gear threats, and I'm the only one who can stop it. I just hope Meryl understands, despite the fact that we almost had something permanent together. I write out a lengthy note for her, in which I explain everything- why I'm going. But it's not just about the Metal Gear threat, but I've got something even bigger, something I've just noticed, and it'd tear us apart anyways. I put the pencil down, readjust the backpack slung over my left shoulder, and creep towards the front door. I slowly close it behind me, lock it, and push the keys through the mail slot.

I'm not coming back. The words of my letter are swimming in my head, I could recite it from memory if I wanted.

"Goodbye Meryl." I whisper. "I don't want to do this, but I've got no other choice. I love you." With that, I turn and begin my trek to the airport, where Otacon is waiting.

* * *

**Eastern Europe, 2014**

"Old. Snake."

Damn... I just... I just... I guess I deserved that. We had something, her and I. Had. And I guess I ruined it. I show her this, by glaring at her.

"And stay out of our way." Meryl threatens. She sighs and turns towards the door, quietly storming out. I can hear her pace slow, however. I just remember all those good times, and how I was the one who ruined it. For a greater cause? It depends. For the world? Yes. For her? No. And as for me, I could've said "Fuck it, let the world burn."

But I didn't, and that'll haunt us for the rest of our lives. What could have been- should have been, even- it wasn't meant to happen, and it never ever will. Now she'll go off with some immature goofball, while I just stand back, and curse my cowardice. I was the man she needed, or rather, wanted. No one needs me, I'm no hero, and now she's aware of that.

I just think of that night I left, and I wonder what would have happened if I turned back. I'd have to sit on the porch all night, as I'd posted my keys into the door. And that note... that fucking note... I'll never forget.

_Meryl,_

_By the time you've read this, I'll be long gone. And I ought to explain why. I've received a word from Otacon that there's many Metal Gear threats globally, and I'm the only one who can stop it. I have to say, this doesn't feel good, leaving you, but I can assure you, it's for the best. Not just for you and me, but for the world. I figured that at some point it would have to end, and I thought it would have ended over that discovery of yours a few months back. Instead, and this makes me sound like a terrible person, to my slight dismay, it made us closer._

_You're probably thinking "That bastard felt bad that we got closer", right? It's because I always knew I'd have to do. For one two reasons; a Metal Gear threat, or a personal issue. Unfortunately, it was both this time around._

_Firstly, this Metal Gear threat is a biggie. I can't disclose the details, and I'm not going with your uncle on this one either, so you won't find out until I return. If I return, that is._

_And my personal issue, this could cause a problem. You may think I'm fretting over nothing, but I'm not too sure. After all, I'm not an ordinary man to begin with. I feel and look older. And you may be thinking "Hey, he is 35 after all, so what?", and I can understand why. Okay, I smoke, so I'd look a bit older, I get it. But what's concerning is I **feel** older. Remember, I used to be a soldier, and I haven't let my exercise routines slip. In other words, physically, I'm in tip-top condition. However, I had an exercise session while you were out, and I ended up collapsing at the end of it. I visited the doctor, and they couldn't find anything wrong. Yeah, more secrets about my life, and I'm sorry for keeping quiet about it. _

_I'm thinking I'm getting older and an accelerated rate, and I'm starting to feel that FOXDIE is part of it. Yeah, 2 years down the road and it's starting to take affect, great huh? __I don't want to just drop dead on you because of this. I suddenly wake up and I'm like 40 years old looking like an 80 year old man or something. I don't want to put you through that._

_Be angry at me, you ought to. I just packed up and left without a word. But I had you in mind when I made my decision, and I believe it's the best for us.__Again, I'm sorry, but I feel it's for the best. I just wish I had recorded this on tape, just so you could hear me say this one last time, but this is all I can do._

_I love you Meryl, thanks for the best two years of my life. Originally, I was just helping you out for your uncle, and at that point, I wouldn't have been able to live with the guilt if something happened to you, as I would have let my friend down. But when Sniper Wolf got you, I knew I wouldn't have been able to live without you. That's what got me through Ocelot's torture. Not the fact that I had to stay alive to stop Metal Gear REX, but I had to stay alive so that you would too._

_But that was then, and I'm afraid I've had to go. I'm sorry this is how it wound up, but I'll see you again someday, I can feel it._

_David_


End file.
